The perceived need for the law arose from the scope and number of laws granting special powers to the executive in times of national emergency (or public danger).

Under the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917 ("TWEA"), starting with Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933, presidents had the power to declare emergencies without limiting their scope or duration, without citing the relevant statutes, and without congressional oversight.[1] The Supreme Court in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer limited what a president could do in such an emergency, but did not limit the emergency declaration power itself. A 1973 Senate investigation found (in Senate Report 93-549) that four declared emergencies remained in effect: the 1933 banking crisis with respect to the hoarding of gold,[2] a 1950 emergency with respect to the Korean War,[3] a 1970 emergency regarding a postal workers strike, and a 1971 emergency in response to inflation.[4] Title V, Section 502 of P.L. 94-412 specifically exempts the statutory authority cited in the Proclamations of these four declared states of national emergency from termination. It then passed the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to restore the emergency power in a limited, overseeable form.

In addition, many provisions of statutory law are contingent on a state of national emergency, as many as 500 by one count.[1]

It was due in part to concern that a declaration of "emergency" for one purpose should not invoke every possible executive emergency power that Congress in 1976 passed the National Emergencies Act. Among other provisions, this act requires the President to declare formally a national emergency and to specify the statutory authorities to be used under such a declaration.

There were 32 declared national emergencies between 1976 and 2001. [2] Most of these were for the purpose of restricting trade with certain foreign entities under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) (50 U.S.C. 1701-1707).

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Several states of emergency have been extended multiple times, effectively creating indefinite states of emergency in particular areas. For example, a state of emergency with respect to Iran, originally declared by Jimmy Carter on November 14, 1979 during the Iranian hostage crisis, has been continuously renewed for over thirty years, most recently by Barack Obama in November 2012.[5][dated info]

^H. Rep. No. 95-459, at 7 (1977) "[the TWEA] has become essentially an unlimited grant of authority for the President to exercise, at his discretion, broad powers in both the domestic and international economic arena, without congressional review. These powers may be exercised so long as there is an unterminated declaration of national emergency on the books, whether or not the situation with respect to which the emergency was declared bears any relationship to the situation with respect to which the President is using the authorities"